


Unreal

by ameliacareful



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Dean cooks for Chuck, Episode 11.21, Gen, Not Lucifer positive, One Shot, Sam reacts to Lucifer, Sam-Centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-18
Updated: 2016-05-18
Packaged: 2018-06-09 05:13:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6891589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ameliacareful/pseuds/ameliacareful
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucifer is in the Bunker and Sam is being perfectly normal, not thinking about it, just handling it.  Dean is doing the same with Chuck watching porn on his laptop.  Sam knows the rules, when shit goes down, they cope.  So, he's coping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unreal

**Author's Note:**

> I'm in Berlin and I don't know when I'll get to see 11.22. 
> 
> Sam coped all through 11.21. Save Lucifer. Sam and Dean both coped with Metatron. Dean never said, 'You made me a demon and made me into everything I despise,' and Sam never said, 'You killed my brother, he became a demon and nearly plastered my brains all over the wall.' Neither of them even punched Metatron.
> 
> I wanted to write about Sam coping with Lucifer. With Dean holding his own shit together in the background.

# # #

Even by the the standards of their lives, this has all been a bit weird.  God is in the bunker watching Dean's porn and eating Chinese food and even weirder, Dean is in tears over a spiritual crises.  This has Sam secretly freaked out.  He's overjoyed to be in the presence of God--er, Chuck.  Frightened.  Shaken.  He can't think. He just wants to go to his knees.  He wants to be special in God's eyes.  Wants Chuck to know how important he is to Sam.  (He's God so apparently he does know.)  Sam realizes he's Chuck's fanboy but he can't seem to do anything about it.

Dean is on edge.  Sam knows Dean is walking the thin edge of holding it together.  The years of hell trauma, Mark of Cain, and (admit it) dealing with Sam's shit like Cage trauma and trials while trying to wash away all feeling with alcohol have Dean holding on by his fingernails.  Nothing proves it more than tears.  If Chuck is around it isn't really Sam's place to lecture on how bad things can happen to good people if God exists.  People have been asking (and answering) that question since they conceived of a God.

Sam has his own answers.  Good doesn't mean anything if you don't actually have a choice between doing the right thing and doing wrong and if someone chooses then their actions are going to have consequences for other people as well as themselves.  If he's been hurt by other people's choices, well, people have been hurt a hell of a lot worse by his.  He really doesn't have room to complain.  Most of all, if Chuck is really, um, CHUCK, then he sees a bigger picture than Sam ever will and knows stuff Sam doesn't so Sam should leave some of the decision making to Him.

Although at the moment the last part is hard to hold on to since Chuck is wearing Dean's bathrobe and boxer's and is eating cornflakes.

Dean is getting coffee.  He's fully dressed.  

"Hey," Sam says, about to ask how Dean is holding up.

"Don't start," Dean growls.

"Maybe we should go get some groceries?  Stop somewhere and have a beer?"

"Can you levitate a car?  Or did you not notice where she's parked?"

They could ask Chuck to move the car or even take one of the other cars parked in the Men of Letter's garage but when Dean is in this kind of mood there's no point.  Those old cars draw too much attention.  He doesn't want to ask Chuck.  Hell, when he's in this kind of mood, the walls are the wrong color and the beer tastes wrong.

"I'm going to do some laundry," Sam says.

"You do that," Dean agrees.

So Sam does a load of laundry.  While the laundry is going he uses his laptop to log everything that's happened.  Metatron, who had murdered his brother, is dead.  Lucifer, and thus Cas, was rescued.  Kevin was in heaven and had said he always trusted them which didn't seem true when Kevin was alive (for good reasons, several of which he noted, especially his failure to protect Kevin while Dean was in Purgatory).  There was a new prophet.

it was all important but writing it, it feels distant.  Like it happened to someone else.

Sam puts the clothes in the dryer and drops his laptop in his room, checks Dean's room.

No sign of Dean in his bedroom, so Sam heads for the kitchen. He has to cross through the library where Chuck is staring at something on Dean's laptop and Lucifer is staring at Chuck. Sam would say he knows all of Lucifer's moods. He'd spent a long time with the archangel, longer than any human has spent with any other human alive. Think of any person you know, Sam has spent more than twice as long with Lucifer than anyone possibly could have with a person. At least. (Honestly, he has no idea how long he spent in The Cage, there were no clocks, no days and nights, he'd not been sane by any definition of the word, and if it wasn't for Death's wall, and the time he'd spent with no memory of it when his soul first came back he doesn't think he'd have ever been anything but psychotic when he came back but never mind.) He's never seen Lucifer like this. Never this combination of naked, needy, angry, and longing.

Lucifer registers that Sam sees him, just a glance. It's like ice water down his back. Sam knows Lucifer will find a way to make him pay for seeing him like this. For seeing him emotionally vulnerable.

Dishes rattle in the kitchen.

Dean's cooking. The familiar, 40's kitchen, like something out of a play. Except of course, for Dean in his henley and jeans.

"What are you making?" Sam asks like everything is normal and the devil isn't having some sort of Oedipal moment with God in the Library.

"Spaghetti," Dean says. "Chuck wants garlic bread."

"Need any help?" Sam asks. Like he always does.

"Need you to stay the fuck out of my kitchen," Dean says, like he always does.

All good. Cooking is probably good for Dean. Bottle beer in easy reach. If Sam can't get Dean out of the bunker, this is better than nothing. Dean's busy with his hands. Dean needs to be doing, right? Dean's a fixer-upper. A maker. Dean's an in the world kind of guy. Sam thinks of all the ways Dean likes to be in the world. Sex. Fixing cars. Repairing shit at Bobby's. If there's nothing else, Dean cleans.

Dean's looking at him. "You need something?"

"No," Sam says.

"You, ah, like that spot? Want one of those roadside markers put there? Sam Winchester stood here?"

No. He just doesn't want to go into the library. Normally when Dean's cooking, he'd be researching. Looking for signs of Amara. But THEY are in there.

Dean's looking at him in a way that says he's acting like a freak. So move. Normal. He's got this. Grow a pair.

Out of the kitchen and through the Library where Chuck is still on the laptop, reading glasses on his nose. He's watching and listening to an old blues song on YouTube. No Lucifer. Where's Lucifer?

He figures he'll get the clothes out of the dryer. Normal shit. Opens the lid and smells the scent of hot denim and clean clothes. Lucifer hoists himself up to sit on the washer and says, "Hello Sam." He doesn't look or sound like Cas. How could they ever have mistaken him for Castiel?

"What do you want," Sam blurts out, unable to play it cool.

Lucifer doesn't smirk. It's the old, gentle Lucifer from before. Before The Cage. From those nights he used to come to Sam and talk, so calm, almost comforting. From the way he was in that very brief time he wore Sam and showed him all the people in his life who had 'guided' him to Detroit. "We keep coming back together," Lucifer says. "It's a strange connection we share, Sam. No one knows you like I do."

Sam can't answer that, bent halfway over, his arms full of dry clothes.

"You were a beautiful boy. You're a beautiful broken man," Lucifer says gently, oh so gently. "You're so tired, Sam."

Don't touch me, Sam thinks. He's afraid Lucifer will caress his cheek. If the Morningstar touches him, he'll scream.

"Cas," Sam whispers. He needs Cas to break through. To silence Lucifer. He needs to break out of this room but he can't pass Lucifer. "Castiel."

"He's not listening," Lucifer explains. "You were so strong. When I rode you, you stayed with me every step of the way. I had to push you down or you were right there, fighting to see. To know. Castiel's not like that. He's not watching. He didn't plan to take back the reins. He's left it all up to me. That's why everything is so hard for you, you can't let go. You're always watching and thinking and worrying." Lucifer leans close to Sam's ear. His breath is cold and Sam shudders. "I know what you really want. Next time, I'll do it. When I take your body, it's over. No heaven or hell. No recycled memories for eternity. No pain. Not even the empty. I'll burn you out like a star, Sam. I owe you that. A flash of white light, and then nothing. Now in anymore."

Lucifer has been looking for a lever for a long time. Looking for a way to pry a yes out of Sam. Sam doesn't know if he even wants it now that he has Cas. Maybe he just wants to break Sam. It's the greatest temptation.

Lucifer cocks his head slightly, sadly. "Don't answer now. We still have to deal with my Father's suicide plan. But after that, you'll come to me. I'll take care of you. You'll win. White light. Like a star."

"No," Sam said.

"Lucifer," Chuck says evenly from the doorway. "Stop."

"I'm just talking," Lucifer says, the thin edge of a whine in his voice.

Chuck just stands, looking inoffensive in his robe and boxers. Lucifer smirks and sidles past him out of the room.

"Dinner's ready," Chuck says, and leaves.

Sam's back hurts from being bent over. He straightens slowly, surprised to find his arms full of laundry. He has no idea what to do with it or what to do with himself. White spots are dancing in front of his eyes like he stood up too quickly.

At least Lucifer didn't reach in and grab his soul. Splatter his insides around the laundry room. In some ways the laundry room is easy to clean. It could be hosed down. There's that. The clothes might be ruined but Dean's good at getting blood and guts out of clothes. They both are. Lots of practice.

He drops the clothes on the folding table and starts folding, lining up the seams on the jeans. Dean likes his t-shirts folded the way they do in the Marines because that's the was Dad taught them. Sam rolls his for packing in a duffle. But for some reason at the moment he can't remember which are his and which are Dean's. White light. Like a star. He says no. He always says no. When he can't remember why he says no because Dean.

"Sam! What the hell are you doing!" Dean says.

He startles so hard he makes a weird, choked noise which is not quite a shout.

"Dude. Chill. Dinner's getting cold."

Right. God called him to dinner. You don't just ignore when God calls you to dinner. "Sorry, was folding laundry."

Dean looks at him like he has two heads. Which he deserves.

He follows Dean to the kitchen. Spaghetti, salad, and the infamous garlic bread is on the table. Chuck is eating. There's no sign of Lucifer.

"Sorry to keep you waiting," he says. (They haven't waited but that's good.) He gets himself a beer and watches his hands take salad and spaghetti and garlic bread. He watches his hand twirl spaghetti and sauce and it does it really well since he has this feeling like he isn't really controlling it. His hand raises it to his mouth. The noodles have a consistency he never really noticed. They aren't really chewable. But he chews them anyway. And the meat is weird, like he never really paid attention. He's eaten spaghetti all his life.

"Good spaghetti," he says to Dean. Like always.

"Thanks," Dean says, like always. Dean looks a little strained around the eyes. Dean is holding it together.

"I love garlic bread," Chuck says, "great stuff. So I've been listening to this guy, Robert Earl Keen, out of Texas. He's got a song called "Corpus Christi Bay" that's really nice." Sam takes a bite of garlic bread. It has a weird consistency, too. The butter is kind of oily. He never noticed how garlic can be bitter. But it's garlic bread. He likes garlic bread. So it's okay.

He's got this. It's fine.

**Author's Note:**

> The song Chuck is recommending: https://youtu.be/ugN0yQ4vIUc


End file.
